Page 34 of Tank’s Weakness

He sighs as he sits down. “Unfortunately no, Miss Harris. We had an alarming call come in about you earlier this morning.”

“I’m sorry, what?” I ask, feeling completely off guard.

He nods. “We had a concerning call regarding your extracurricular after-school hours. Specifically those you spend time with.” I open my mouth to protest, but he raises his hand. “I know I can’t dictate who you spend time with outside of work hours, but once this is brought to our door and disrupts operating procedures, I’ll be forced to step in. I only called you in here, Miss Harris, to give you a warning. You upset someone, and they are looking to cause problems for you professionally.”

“My ex,” I mutter without thinking about it.

It’s Blaine. There’s no one else who it could be. Only he would try to do something like this. He’s so conceited that he must think if he ruins my job that I’ll be forced to crawl back to him since he is making money at the law firm. He is so sure he will pass the bar and be hired on as a lawyer, which is ridiculous.

“Excuse me?” Principal Marshall says, reminding me that I’m not alone.

I clear my throat. “I have an ex that isn’t happy that our relationship ended. I just started seeing someone who would never do anything to jeopardize us or the kids, and I have a feeling my ex found out and isn’t happy. I’m sorry. I would say it won’t happen again, but we both know that we can’t control the actions of others.”

His eyes narrow. “As a friend, and not as your boss, Delaney, that doesn’t sound like you are in a safe situation.”

“My best friend thinks he’s stalking me,” I blurt out.

His body tenses. “Then I have to insist that you take this to the authorities, whatever proof you have. Try to get a protective order against him. While it might not stop him from harassing you, you’ll at least have a paper trail if, God forbid, you need it.”

Closing my eyes, I let his words settle inside of me. I don’t want to take those steps, but Blaine is forcing my hand. He has overstepped in such a major way that I don’t see any other option. Not anymore at least.

The gentle boy I met when I was young has turned into someone I don’t even recognize, and I hate it. I hate that he’s souring what we had and flushing all the good memories down the drain.

“You’re right,” I murmur softly.

Blaine’s forced my hand for the last time, and I won’t put up with his shit. Not anymore.

Tank

When I took Hanks back to Smoke, he sang like a fucking canary. He told us everything we needed to know. Some of the major players, when the next game was, and most importantly, who was in charge.

A couple of fucking lawyers.

Some greedy fucks who thought they needed to line their pockets even more.

Lucky for us, though, Hanks told us all about the exclusive game they were holding tonight. In the middle of the damn week.

Bear, Crow, Jagger, and I park a block of the way from the warehouse.

“Why did I have to drive the cage again?” Jagger whines when he jumps out of the van.

“Because you haven’t been around as long as we have,” Bear says.

Jagger scoffs. “It’s kind of hard to beat you two when you came with the pres,” he says, referring to Bear and me.

“Not wrong, kid. Not wrong,” Crow murmurs before turning toward me. “Are you sure we don’t need any more people?”

I raise a brow. “If we can’t take down six players and two leaders, we have an issue.”

“What about the dealer and whoever else they have helping?” Crow presses.

Bear shakes his head. “Smoke doesn’t care about them, but if history is anything to go by on these types of things, they will stick around and sing.”

I nod. “They are usually doing it because they don’t have an option. It will all work out. Everyone strapped? Got zip ties? Smoke wants these dickheads alive.”

The guys nod.

“All right. Then let’s go rain on some motherfucker’s parade.” I smirk.